My first salutation was from three big grizzly poachers’ snaps, a kind of

cross between a bloodhound, greyhound, and a bulldog, that lay at the

entrance of a wigwam, in which lay a burly fellow marked with small-pox,

and whose hair was close shaven off his head and from round his coarse,

thick neck. This specimen of an English gipsy possessed a puggish kind

of nose, a large mouth, and his clothes seemed “greasy and shiny.” The

woman looked an intelligent, strong kind of woman, and well fitted, to

all appearance, for a better life. Round a tin pot upon the greensward

there were three other gipsy tramps, kneeling and gnawing meat off a bone

like dogs, with bread by their sides. They did not growl like dogs, but

they showed me their teeth and muttered, and this was quite sufficient.

The occupation of this gang seemed to be that of attending to a cocoa-nut

establishment, the profits of which, during the races, they had travelled

from London by road in three days to secure. To me it appeared all were

fish that came to their net; and if they did not come of their own

accord, they would not think twice before fetching them. This gipsy

wigwam was the kitchen, drawing-room, dining-room, bedroom, &c., for four

men, one woman, and two big girls, not one of whom could read and write.

The only little gleam of light which shone from the conversation in this

dark abode was when they referred to some gipsies, who, they said, had

been “putting on a pretence of religion in order to fill their pocket,”

and they knew one who “saved over £800 since he had been religious.” “If

I must be religious, I would be religious, and no mistake about it,” said

another. At this they began to swear fearfully. I mentioned several

gipsies who had given up their old habits, and, as I told them, had begun

to lead better lives. “Never,” they said, with a vengeance; to which I

answered, “By their fruits shall ye know them.” I then shook hands, and

wended my way to the next establishment. This was an old cart covered

over entirely with calico from the ridge to the ground. Connected with

this van there were two men and a boy, who, it seems, are novices at the

cocoa-nut profession. To me it appeared that they were tired of the hard

work and tightness of town life, and were trying their fortune at

gipsying and idle-mongering. On the course there would be nearly twenty

cocoa-nut “saloons.” Connected with three of the vans on the course

there were sixteen children and eight men and women, only one of whom

could read and write. In one of the three vans there was a poor little

girl of about nine summers evidently in the last stage of consumption.

Her cheeks were sunken, shallow, and pale; her fingers were long and

thin; her eyes glassy bright, and black hair hung in tangled masses over

her shoulders. I gave the poor girl a penny as she stood at the door of

the filthy van, for which, with much effort she said, “Thank you, sir,”

and sat down on the floor. I said to the mother, formerly a Smith, but

now a G—, “Why don’t you get the poor child attended to?” She replied as

follows: “Well, sir, gipsy children have much more to put up with now

than they formerly had. They cannot half stand the cold and damp we used

to do. They are always catching cold. I only bought a bottle of

medicine this morning for which I paid half a crown, and I cannot be

expected to do more. She has been staying some time with her grandmother

at Bristol, but we did not like leaving her there in case anything

happened to her. If she is to die, we gipsies like our children to die

in the van or tent with us, as may be. We like to see the last of them.

We have hard times of it, we poor women and children have, I can assure

you, sir.” The woman had now begun to do some washing in earnest, not

before it was needed, and while she was scrubbing away at the rags in a

tin pail, she began to tell me some of her history and that of her

grandfather. She said that her mother had “had fifteen children, all

born under the hedge-bottom, nearly all of whom are alive.” I asked her

if any of her family could read and write, and she said, “No, excepting

the poor little girl you see, and she can read and write a little, having

been to a day school in Bristol for a few weeks last winter. I wish they

could read and write, sir, it would be a blessed thing if they could.”

She now referred to her grandfather. At this her eyes brightened up.

She said, “My grandfather was a soldier in the Queen’s service”—the poor

gipsy woman did not understand history so well as cooking hedgehogs in a

patter of clay—“and fought in the battle when Lord Nelson was killed.

And do you know, sir, after Lord Nelson was killed, he was put into a

cask of rum to be preserved, while he was brought to England to be

buried; and I dare say that you will not believe me—my grandfather was

one of those who had charge of the body; but he got drunk on some of the

rum in which Lord Nelson was pickled, and he was always fond of talking

about it to his dying day.” I said, “Do you like rum.” “Yes, we poor

gipsies could live upon rum and ‘’bacca.’” In the van in which the poor

gipsy child and its mother lived there were a man, a baby a few weeks

old, and four other children, huddling together night and day in a most

demoralizing and degrading condition. While standing by the side of this

tumble-down van I found that vans and tents, in which people eat, live,

sleep, and die, are put to other shocking, filthy, and sickening purposes

during fairs and races than habitations for human beings to dwell in.

Sanitary officers, moralists, and Christians must be asleep all over the

country. In going by and round one van I noticed an old woman storming

away at some children with an amount of temper and earnestness that

almost frightened me. Immediately I arrived at the door, and almost

before I could say “Jack Robinson,” she dropped down into a position with

which miners and gipsies are so familiarly accustomed, and began to

tremble, shed “crocodile tears,” and tell a pitiful tale of the sorrows

and troubles of her life, intermixing it with “my dear sirs,” “good

mans,” “God bless yous.” Every now and then she would look up to heaven,

and present a picture of the most saintly woman upon earth. When I asked

her how old she was, she said she was a long way over seventy, but could

not tell me exactly. She further said that she had had sixteen children,

all born under the hedge-bottom, nearly all of them gipsies up and down

the country, some of whom were grandmothers and grandfathers at the

present time. And then she would begin another pitiful tale as follows,

“If you please, my good sir, will you give me a copper, I do assure you

that I have not tasted anything to eat this day, and I am almost famished

with hunger.” And then with trembling emotion she said, wringing her

hands, “I shall die before morning.” After my visits to the other vans,

and before going home, I turned unexpectedly to have another peep at the

old gipsy woman, whom I found to be a long way off dying, and in all

probability I shall see her again before she passes over to the great

eternity.

[Picture: An English gipsy Duchess—Smith—“rheumaticky and lame”]

Among the rest, sitting upon a low stool and drinking beer, there was a

big, bony, coarse Frenchman, whom I found out to be a Communist. He was

ostensibly selling calico, lace, and other trifles. His eyes were fiery,

mouth ugly, on account of its having been put to foul purposes, and his

demeanour that of an excited Fenian maddened by revenge and murder.

Round him were a number of poor ignorant folks who could neither read nor

write, and as they listened to his lies and infamy about the clergy,

ministers, the well-to-do tradesmen, professional gentlemen, noblemen,

and royalty, they opened their eyes and mouths as if horrified at his

words and actions. Among other things he said the clergy of the Church

of England were in receipt of over £20,000,000 per annum out of the

pockets of the poor. I questioned him as to the source from which it

came, and if he could point out the items in the Budget. At this he

began to get excited and said, “It came from direct and indirect taxes.”

I said, “Can you give me one instance or give me particulars in any shape

setting forth the direct taxes in this country collected for the benefit

of the clergy to the amount you say?” Instead of replying to this

question he began to stutter and stammer, and appeared before me with his

fists shut, exhibiting all sorts of mountebank megrims to the terror of

some of the listeners and amusement of others. In the end I calmed him

down, and he asked me if I would buy a parrot of him if I saw him again

in two years’ time. One of those who stood by said, “He has got parrots

enough of his own without buying more.”

Connected with one of the cocoa-nut establishments, and owned by a

good-hearted gipsy from London, there were the clowns, fools, hunchbacked

old women, and other simpletons to catch the “foolish and the gay.” At

the back of this establishment there were all sorts of painted devices,

or I should rather say “daubed” devices, upon the sheets, full of satire

which the fools with plenty of money could not read. One was a barber

shaving his customers; another was a donkey, after he had been well fed,

turning his heels towards his silly friends and kicking them in the face

and sending them sprawling upon the ground with their pockets empty; and

many others with the flags of “Old England” flying in all directions. I

learned some time after that the owner of this establishment during the

two days’ races cleared nearly twenty pounds out of fools and cocoa-nuts,

giving thousands of young folks of both sexes a taste for gambling, and

then clearing off to London with smiles and chuckles, and his poaching

dogs at his heels, leaving his customers to say the next morning, “What

fools we have been, to be sure!” If I had been at the door of their

bedroom I should have bawled out, “No greater fools in existence could

possibly be. When you went upon the race-course you had money if you had

not any sense; this morning you have neither money nor sense, and now you

are neither more nor less than a third of a shrivelled-up sausage without

any seasoning in your nature, unsuitable for pickling and not worth

cooking, fit for nothing but the dunghill, and food for cats and dogs.”

I now took another stroll amongst the gipsies at the other end of the

“course,” and came up against one who owned the “steam-flying

dobby-horses;” but before I began to chat with him one of the gipsy women

whispered in my ear, “It is his wife that has made him; she is very

good-looking and one of the best women in the world; no one can tell why

it was that she took up with the man as his second wife. He would not

have been worth twopence had it not been for her. She is a rare good un,

an’ no mistake. You must not tell him that I say so. She sees to all

the business and he dotes over her. He is not a bad sort of a chap.” I

soon began to chat with the “dobby-horse” owner, and he was not long

before he began to tell me of his cleverness and what he had passed

through, as follows: “You see, sir, a few years ago I had to borrow three

shillings and sixpence to help me to get away from this town, now I’ve

turned the tide and got at the top of the hill. These ‘shooting

galleries,’ ‘dobby-horses,’ ‘flying boxes,’ vans, and waggons are my

own.” Pointing with his finger to a new van, he said, “I made that

myself last winter, and have done all the painting upon the ‘horses’

myself.” The steam organ, the steam whistle, the shouting, screaming,

and hurrahing, and his face having been in the wars, made it difficult

for me to hear him. He now spoke out louder and referred to family

affairs and some of his early history. “I left Bagworth when I was a

lad, owing to the cruel treatment of a stepmother, and wandered up and

down the country in rags and barefooted, sleeping in barns, and houses,

and piggeries, and other places I could creep into; and in course of time

I fell in with the gipsies and married one. But she was a wretch; oh!

she was a bad un, and I was glad when she died. I am thankful I have got

a better one now. She is a good un; but I must not say anything about

her, we get on well together, and she keeps me straight.” “Bang bang”

and “crack crack” went the bullets out of the rifle guns close to our

ears, against the metal plates, through a long sheet iron funnel of about

twelve inches diameter. “Now then,” cried out a little sharp, dark-eyed,

nimble woman of about thirty-five years—of course upon this point I had

no means of knowing or guessing exactly; I had not examined her teeth.

She might say she was only twenty-eight, a favourite age with some maids

looking out for husbands—“be quick and rub out the marks upon the plate.”

And away the old man trotted at his wife’s bidding, as all good husbands

who are not capable of being masters should do. A “slap” and a “dash”

with the old gipsy’s brush, and all the “pops” were for over obliterated.

What a blessed thing it would be for themselves and future generations if

all the sins committed upon the racecourse that day could have been wiped

out as easily. Why not?

Upon the “course” there were, at a very rough calculation, nearly fifty

families of gipsies in vans, tents, and carts, in which vans, tents, &c.,

there lived over a hundred and fifty children and one hundred men and

women sleeping inside and huddling together with their eyes open, like

rabbits at the bottom of a flour cask, when no other eye sees them but

God’s. While the jockeys were riding to death upon classical horses with

the devil at their heels, to a place where, as Dr. Grosart says in the

_Sunday at Home_, “The surges of wrath crash on the shores infernal,” I

mused, pondered, and then wended my way home for meditation and

reflection, and, as a writer in the _Churchman’s Penny Magazine_ says—

“We take Thy providence and word

As landmarks on our way.”

Rambles amongst the Gipsies upon the Warwick Racecourse.

SOME men’s lives, it would seem, are decreed by Providence to be spent

among the “extremes” of life and the associations of the world. Some are

walking, talking, humming, and singing to themselves of the joys of

heaven, the pleasures of the world, and the consoling influences of

religion under the bright sunlight of heaven, as they, with light tread,

step along to the goal where they will be surrounded with endless joy,

where the tears of sorrow, bereavement, and anguish are unknown, and

where the little dancing, prattling joys of earth have been transplanted

into the angelic choir of heaven. There are others to be seen sitting

under the shade upon some ditch bank with their elbows upon their knees,

and their faces buried in their hands, enveloped in meditation and

reflection with reference to the doings and dealings of Providence

towards them on their journey of life, with an outlook at times that does

not seem the least encouraging and hopeful, ending in mysteries and

doubts as to the future, and the part they will be called upon to play in

the ending drama. There are many who seem to be groping their way among

the dark and heavy clouds which have been filled by God, in His wisdom,

weighted with trouble and circumstances of earth and self; and while

pacing among the clouds and darkness which have settled upon them almost

too heavy to be borne, they imagine their lot to be the hardest in the

world. Such I thought, has been my lot, as I tripped along, with bag in

hand, over the green carpet, while the warbling little songsters were

singing overhead, and a bright spring sun shining in my face, bringing

life into, on every hand, the enchanting beauty of the orchards,

hedgerows, and meadows, sending forth delicious scents, and lovely sights

of the daisies, primroses, and violets, and a thousand other heavenly

things, on my way to the station on a lovely spring morning to ramble

among the gipsies and others upon the Warwick racecourse.

In the train, between Welton and Leamington, I met with some sporting

“company’s servants.” One said, “Y. and G. were two of the greatest

scamps in the world. When once the public backed a horse, they were sure

to ‘scratch it.’” They discussed minutely their “bobs,” “quids,” losses,

crosses, and gains. One of the sporting “company’s servants” was a

guard, and he said, “I generally gets the ‘tip’ from some of the leading

betting men I know, who often travel by my train to the races, and I’m

never far wrong.” Another “company’s servant,” related his betting

experiences. “One Sunday,” said he, “I was at Bootle church, near

Liverpool, and heard the preacher mention in his sermon ‘Bend Or,’ and

warned his congregation to have nothing to do with races, and I concluded

that there was something in the horse, or he would not have mentioned his

name in the pulpit. So on Monday morning I determined to put three ‘bob’

on ‘Bend Or,’ and the result was I had twelve ‘bob’ and a half, that was

a good day’s work for me, which I should not have got if it had not been

for our parson.” I said to the “company’s servant,” “Do you really think

that racing is profitable for those engaged in it, taking all things into

consideration?” “Well,” he said, “to tell you the truth, sir, I do not

think it is. I have often seen dashing, flashing betting characters

compelled to leave their boxes at the station in pawn for a railway

ticket to enable them to get home.”

After leaving the train and the Avenue Station behind me, I made my way

to my friends, Mr. and Mrs. John Lewis, for “labour and refreshment,”

when, during my midnight tossings, nocturnal wanderings, and rambles in

wonderland, the following rough and crude germs of thought prevented me

getting the sweet repose which tired nature required:—

The beautiful snowdrop of heaven, and the first in God’s garden, is a

pretty lively child growing up good and pure in the midst of a wretched

family, surrounded by squalor, ignorance, and sin.

They are enemies, and beware of them, who, in your presence, laugh when

you laugh, sing when you sing, and cry, without tears, when you cry.

A scientific Christian minister preaching science instead of the gospel,

causing his flock to wander among doubts and hazy notions, is a

scriptural roadman sitting upon a heap of stones philosophizing with

metaphysical skill upon the fineness of the grain, beauty, and excellent

qualities of a piece of granite, while the roads he is in charge of are

growing over with grass, bewildering to the members of his church as to

which is the right road, and leading them into a bog from which they

cannot extricate themselves, and have to cry out for the helping hand to

save, ere they sink and are lost.

Every glass of beer drunk in a public-house turns a black hair white.

When a man or woman draws the last sixpence out of his or her pocket in a

public-house, they pull out a cork that lets tears of sorrow flow.

A publican’s cellar is the storehouse of sorrows.

A Christian minister who preaches science instead of Christianity and the

Bible, is going through a dark tunnel with a dim lamp at the wrong end of

his boat.

Beer and spirits make more gaps in a man’s character than righteous women

can mend.

The finest pottery has to pass through three crucial stages during

manufacture before it can be said to be perfect. First is the “biscuit

oven,” whereby the vessels are made hard and durable. Second is the

“hardening-on kiln,” or an oven with an even, moderate heat to harden or

burn on the surface the various designs and colours which have been

placed there by artistic hands. And the third is the “glost oven,” which

brings out the transparent gloss and finish, and gives beauty to the

gold, oxide, cobalt, nickel, manganese, ochre, stone, flint, bone, iron,

and clay, &c. So in like manner it is with the highest type of a

Christian character. First, there is the family circle with its moulding

and parental influence: this may be called the “biscuit oven,” fixing on

the preparation for the fights and hardships of life. Second, there is

the school and educational progress, which may be compared to the

“hardening-on kiln.” And third, there is the work of the Holy Spirit:

this may be compared to the “glost oven,” which gives the gloss, touch,

and transparency to the vessel. Each of these stages will include the

progressive steps of manufacture leading up to them.

Spectacles are of no use to a man in the dark. So in like manner

scientific problems cannot help a man to see his way if he is in

spiritual darkness.

Acrobatic Christians are those whose spiritual backbone and moral

uprightness have been damaged by contortions, megrims, twirlings, and

twisting their Christian character to suit circumstances.

So long as a man keeps upright the law of gravitation has but little

power over him; immediately he begins to stoop its influence is soon

manifest. So in like manner it is with an upright Christian, and so long

as he keeps his perpendicular position by walking erect in God’s love and

favour he is all right, and the influence of hell trebled cannot bend or

pull him down; immediately he stoops to listen to the voice of the

charmer, and gives way to the gravitation of hell—sin—down he goes, and

nothing but a miracle will bring him upright again.

A hollow, hypocritical, twirl-about Christian, with no principle to guide

him, is as an empty, shallow vessel pushed out to sea without either

compass, rudder, or sails.

A man who, Christ-like, stoops to pick up a fallen brother, or who guides

and places a youth upon a successful path, leading to immortality, is a

man among men whom God delights to honour, as Jupiter was among the

heathen gods, and he will be doubly crowned. His crown upon earth will

be studded with lasting pleasure, shining brighter than diamonds; but his

crown in heaven will be studded and illumined with the everlasting smiles

of those he has saved, surpassing in grandeur all the precious stones in

creation.

When a professing Christian visits the tap-room and places of light

amusement with the hope of finding safe anchorage from the storms of

life, it may be taken as an indication that he is at sea without a

rudder, and the temporary one manufactured in a gin-palace out of frothy

conversation will not bring him safe to land.

To hold up good works without faith and prayer as a shelter from an angry

God for wrong-doing, is like holding a riddle over your head as a

protection from a thunderstorm.

A man indulging in a lifetime of sin and iniquity, and then praying to

God and giving alms in the last hours of his existence in the hope of

securing eternal life and endless joy, is like a fowl with a broken neck

and wings struggling to pick up golden grain to give it life and strength

to fly to roost.

Love and spite dwelling in the heart can no more make a perfect Christian

than poisoned vinegar and cream can make pure honey.

Every huntsman who jumps a fence makes it easier for those who choose to

follow; and so it is with wrongdoers who jump the bounds of sin and

folly. They are teaching those who follow to shun the plain, open path,

and to take to the walls, fences, and ditches, which end in a broken

neck, amidst the applause of fools.

Hotbeds of envy and hatred, heated with burning passion, have been

productive of more evil results, direful consequences, bloodshed, cruel

deaths, and foul murders than all the poison extracted from fungi,

hemlock, foxgloves, and deadly nightshade have done since the world

began, or could do, even if envy and hatred were to die to-day and

poisons worked death to the end of time.

The morals and good deeds of a wicked, sensual, selfish man are the

artificial flowers of hell.

Some professing Christians have only sufficient Christianity to make a

pocket mirror, which the possessor uses in company as a schoolboy would

to make “Jack-a-dandies.”

Crowns of credit or renown lightly won sit lightly upon the head, and are

easily puffed off by the first breath of public opinion.

A man who trusts to his own self-righteousness to get him to heaven is

wheeling a heavily and unevenly laden wheelbarrow up a narrow, slippery

plank over a deep ravine, with a wheel in the front of his wheelbarrow

that is twisted, loose, and awry.

The devil plays most with those he means to bite the hardest.

Singing heavenly songs in earthly sorrows brings joy tinged with the

golden light of heaven on the mourner.

To get the cold, poisonous water of selfishness from our hearts God has

often to furrow and drain our nature and affections by afflictions and

cross purposes.

Too-much conceited young Christians with little piety, like young

“quickset” hedges, become of more use to the Christian Church and the

world after they have been cut down by persecution and bent by troubles

and afflictions.

Sin in the first instance is as playful as a kitten and as harmless as a

lamb; but in the end it will bite more than a tiger and sting more than a

nest of wasps.

A Christian professor outside the range of miracles and under the

influence of the devil is he who is trying to swim to heaven with a

barrel of beer upon his back.

As fogs are bad conductors of light, sight, and sound, so in like manner

is a Christian living in foggy doubts a bad conductor of the light,

sight, and sounds of heaven.

Cold, slippery Christians who have no good object before them, and

without a noble principle to guide them, are like round balls of ice on a

large dish; and to set such Christians to work is a worse task than

serving the balls out with a knitting needle.

Crotchety, doubting, scientific Christians are manufacturers of more

deadly poisons than that produced from pickled old rusty nails.

The loudest and most quickening sounds to be heard upon earth are from a

beautiful sweet child as it lies in the stillness of the loving arms of

death.

* * * * *

Breakfast being over, with my “Gladstone bag” I begun my tramp-trot to

the “course,” and while walking leisurely under the tall trees in one of

the avenues at Leamington, on my way to the racecourse, a circumstance

occurred—which my friend the gipsies say “forbodes good luck and a

fortune, and that I shall rise in the world and have many friends.”

Gipsies say and do queer things. To see, say they, the tail of the first

spring lamb instead of its face forebodes “bad luck” to the beholder

through the year. In the tramcar there was a little dog with a silver

collar round its neck, evidently without an owner. The pretty little

white English terrier whined about in quest of its master or mistress,

but neither was to be found. In the tramcar there was a police inspector

on his way to do double duty at the racecourse. This kind-hearted man

tried hard by coaxing, sop, and caresses to be a friend to the dog; but

no, and for the life of him the dog could not be brought round to look

upon the inspector as a friend. Immediately the tramcar stopped, the

little dog bounded off in search of its owner, but none was to be found,

and the last I saw of the inspector and the lost dog was up one of the

streets at Warwick, with the dog ahead and its tail between its legs, and

the inspector scampering after it as fast as he could run, calling out,

“Stop it,” “Stop it,” “It’s lost;” and away they both went out of sight,

and neither the one nor the other have I seen since.

I once worked for a master in the slave yards of Brickdom in

Staffordshire, who owned a bulldog. This dog took it into his head one

day to leave its cruel master, and seek fresh lodgings of a better kind.

Spying its opportunity, off it started out of the brickyard as if it was

shot out of a gun; and the master for whom I slaved could not whistle,

and knowing that I could whistle as well as I could cry and sing, bawled

out to me, “Whistle him, whistle him, or I’ll black your eye! I’ve lost

a dog worth five shillings; whistle him!” Of course, under the

circumstances, trembling with fear and fright, I could not “whistle” very

loud. The consequence was, the dog was lost, and I got a “good kick and

a punch.” If the inspector could have whistled for the lost dog in the

tones of its mistress, it would have saved his legs and brought the dog

back to its comfortable home.

I was no sooner upon the racecourse, paddling through the quagmire, than

I was brought face to face with some of the gipsies—the Hollands and the

Claytons. I had not long been talking to them before one of the old

Hollands came up to me and said, “I know who you are, Mr. Smith of

Coalville; lend’s your hand, and let’s have a good shake. I would not

mind giving five shillings for your likeness.” I told him he need not be

at the expense of giving five shillings for a flattering photograph; he

could have a good stare at the original, with all its faults, blemishes,

and scars, for nothing. In my hands were a lot of picture cards for the

gipsy children, given to me by the Religious Tract Society, upon which

were a lot of texts of Scripture, in pretty patterns. Some of them read

as follows: “My son, forget not my law;” “Thou art my trust from my

youth;” “Thou God seest me;” “Thy word is a lamp unto my feet;” “My son,

give me thine heart;” “Wisdom is more precious than rubies;” “Enter not

into the path of the wicked;” “Even a child is known by his doings;”

“Feed my lambs;” “Hear instruction, and be wise;” “Show piety at home;”

“The Lord bless and keep thee;” “The Lord preserveth all them that love

Him;” “I will guide thee with mine eye;” “The Lord shall preserve thee

from all evil;” and many more. Immediately I had begun to distribute

them among the children clustered round me, Alfred Clayton came up to me,

as close as he could get, and he said, as I read out some of the texts to

the children “I do like them; I could die by them; I’d sooner have some

of them than a meal’s meat at any time. Do give me some, Mr. Smith, and

I’ll get somebody to read them to me, and will take great care of them.

I’ll have them framed and hung up.” The Hollands now asked me to go into

their van, which invitation I gladly accepted. I was no sooner seated

than Mrs. Holland, a big strong woman with pipe in her mouth, began to

tell me how many children they had had, and that she had “been a nurse

for the Lord,” for she had “had twelve children, nine of whom had died

before they were three years old, and three are living, two of whom you

see.” At this point she flew off at a tangent in language not suited for

this book. Any one hearing her would think that she was a somewhat queer

and strange kind of “nurse for the Lord.” Mr. Holland the elder told me

of one poor gipsy woman, who, through her unfaithfulness and bad conduct,

had come to an untimely end, so much so that it was with much difficulty

and risk her rotten remains were placed in a coffin. Sad to say, her

sins were not buried with her. Her family carry the marks upon them.

After chatting about all sorts of things and old times, with the

Leicestershire gipsies from Barlestone and Barwell, I turned in with some

gipsy Smiths from Gloucestershire, whose van and tents were on the other

side of the “grand stand.” I found that in three of the vans there were

twenty-one children of various sizes and ages, and nine men and women

sleeping and huddling together in wretchedness. One of the gipsy women

told me that she had had “nineteen children all born alive.” As they sat

round the fire upon the grass, I began to give them some cards, and while

I was doing so, one of the men, Reservoir Smith, broke out in language

not very elevating, and said among other things, “What use are picture

cards to either the children or us; there is not one in the whole bunch

that can tell a letter; and as for saying prayers, they do not know what

it is and where to begin. We cannot pray ourselves, much less teach our

children. Who are we to pray to? Parsons pray, and not we poor folks.”

A gipsy woman must needs have her say in the matter, and said as follows,

“Do not mind what he says master, if you will give me some of the cards

we will have them framed; they will do to look at if we cannot read

them.” At this they clustered round me—men, women and children; and I

distributed cards and pence to the little ones as far as my stock would

allow, with which all were delighted.

In the midst of this large group of idle men and women, ragged, dirty,

unkempt, and ignorant children with matted hair, there were two of the

Smith damsels—say, of about eighteen or twenty years—dressed in all the

gay and lively colours imaginable, whose business was not to attend to

the cocoa-nut “set outs,” but to wheedle their way with gipsy fascination

amongst the crowd of race-goers, to gain “coppers” in all sorts of

questionable ways of those “greenhorns” who choose to listen to their

“witching” tales of gipsydom. Their “lurchers” and “snap” dogs came and

smelt at my pantaloons, and skulked away with their tails between their

legs.

Upon the course there were over thirty adult gipsies, and nearly forty

children living in tents and vans, and connected in one way or other with

the gipsy Smiths, Greens, Hollands, Stanleys, and Claytons, not one of

whom—excepting one Stanley—could read and write a simple sentence out of

any book, and attended neither a place of worship nor any Sunday or day

school. When I explained to them the plan I proposed for registering

their vans, and bringing the children within reach of the schoolmaster,

they one and all agreed to it without any hesitation, and said as

follows, that “it would be the best thing in the world, and unitedly

expressed more than once, ‘Thank you, sir,’ ‘Thank you, sir.’”

Rain was now coming down, and the races were about to commence; therefore

my gipsy congregation had begun to find its way to the various cocoa-nut

establishments to begin business in earnest. With this exodus going on

around me, and in the midst of oaths, swearing, betting, banging,

cheating, lying, shouting, and thrashing, I turned quickly into Alfred

Clayton’s van to have a friendly chat with him with “closed doors.” The

conversation I had with him earlier in the afternoon led me to think that

some kind of influence had been at work with him that one does not see in

a thousand times among gipsies. Evidently a softening process had taken

hold of him which I wanted to hear more about. With his wife and another

gipsy friend in charge of his cocoa-nut business, we closed the door of

the van, and he began his tale in answer to my questions. I asked him

whether they had always been gipsies. To which he answered as follows:

“My grandfather was a ‘stockiner’ at Barlestone, and lived in a cottage

there; but in course of time he began to do a little hawking, first out

of a basket round the villages, and then in a cart round the country. He

then took to a van; and the same thing may be said of the Claytons.

Originally they were ‘stockiners’ at Barwell, a village close to

Barlestone, and began to travel as my grandfather and father had done.

Thus you will see that the two families of gipsies, Claytons and

Hollands, are mixed up pretty much. My father is, as you know, a

Holland, and my mother a Clayton, whose name I take. At the present

time, out of the original family of Hollands at Barlestone, and the

original family of Claytons at Barwell, there are seven families of

Hollands travelling the country at the present time, and fifteen families

of Claytons travelling in various parts of Staffordshire and other

places.” From the original two families it will be seen that there are

over a hundred and fifty men, women, and children who have taken to

gipsying within the last fifty years, not half a dozen of whom can read

and write, with all the attendant consequences of this kind of a vagabond

rambling life; which the more we look into, it is plain that Christianity

and civilization, as we have put them forth to reclaim those of our own

brothers and sisters near home, have proved a failure, not on account of

the blessed influences of themselves being not powerful enough, but in

the lack of the application of them to the gipsies by those who profess

to have received those world-moving principles in their hearts. In the

midst of this dark mass of human beings moving to and fro upon our lovely

England, one little cheering ray is to be seen. Alfred Clayton tells us

this. When he was staying at Leicester with his van some three years

since, he stole like a thief in the night into the “Salvation Warehouse”

at the bottom of Belgrave Gate, and while he was there an influence

penetrated through the hardened coats of ignorance and crime, and the

ramification of sin in all its worst shape to the depth of his heart, and

awakened a chord of sympathy in his nature which has not died out, or

wholly left him to this day. “Jesus the name high over all” caused him

to open his ears in a manner they had never been opened before, and

wonder what it all meant. This visit to the “Salvation warehouse” was

not lost upon him, or without its effects upon his conduct. One cold

wintry day, some two years ago, he was staying with his wife and family

in this van on the roadside between Atherstone and Hinckley, when a

youth, apparently about eighteen years old, came limping along the road,

dressed in what had once been a fashionable suit of clothes, but now was

little better than rags. His face was thin and pale, and his fingers

long, and his neck bare. Upon his feet were two odd old worn-out shoes,

and without stockings upon his legs; and as the forlorn youth neared the

van and its occupants at dusk, he said, “Will you please give me a bit of

bread, for I feel very hungry.” Clayton said, without much inquiry and

hesitation, “Come into the van and warm yourself,” and while the youth

was doing so, they got ready a crust of bread and cheese and some tea,

which were devoured ravenously. Clayton learned that the stranger was

related to one of the leading manufacturers named at Leicester, and well

known as being rich; but unfortunately for the poor youth, his father

died, and his stepmother had sold everything and cleared away to America,

leaving this well-educated lad without any money, or means of earning

money, to grapple with the world and its difficulties for a livelihood as

best he could. Clayton, in the kindness of his heart, took the youth

into the van, and he travelled up and down the country with them as one

of their own during the space of two years, when owing to “his being a

gentleman,” and a “capital scollard,” he was helpful to the gipsy family

in more ways than one. After the two years’ gipsying spent by the youth

with his kind friends the Claytons in rambling about the country, some

kind friends at Atherstone took pity on him, and he is there to-day,

gradually working his position back into civilized society, and a

respectable member of the community, notwithstanding the treatment he has

received at the hands of his cruel stepmother. After the meeting at the

“Salvation Warehouse” Clayton had been seen and heard more than once,

checking swearing and other sins so common to gipsies; but had never

finally decided to leave gipsying and begin a better life until last

Christmas. The steps which led up to his “great resolve,” he related to

me as follows: “Mr. Smith, you must know that I have been about as bad a

man as could be found anywhere. I felt at times, through drink and other

things, that I would as soon murder somebody as I would eat my supper; in

fact, I didn’t care what I did; and things went on in this way till my

little girl, about three years old, and who I loved to the bottom of my

heart, was taken ill and died. She had such bright eyes, a lovely face,

and curls upon her head. She was my darling pet, and always met me with

a smile; but she died and lies buried in Polesworth churchyard.” At this

Clayton burst into crying and sobbing like a child. “I vowed,” said

Clayton, “on the day, at the side of the grave, she, my poor darling, was

buried, that I would not touch drink for a month, and do you know, Mr.

Smith of Coalville, when the month was gone, I did not feel to crave for

drink any more, and I have not had any up till now.” He now dried his

eyes, and his face brightened up with a smile, and I said to him in the

van, “Let us kneel down and thank God for helping you to make this

resolution, and for grace to help you to keep it.” In the midst of the

hum, shouting, and swearing of the races, we shut the door of the van;

and after we had got off our knees, he knelt down again and again, and

began to pray, with tears in his eyes, as follows:—

“O Lord Jesus, Thou knowest that I have been a bad sinner. O God, thou

knowest I have been very wicked in many ways, and done many things I

should not have done; but Thou hast told me to come to Thee and Thou wilt

forgive me. Do my God forgive me for all the wrong I have done, and help

me to be a better man, and never touch drink again any more, for Thou

knowest it has been my ruin. Help me to live a good life, so that I may

meet my little darling in heaven, who lies in Polesworth churchyard. Do,

O Lord, bless my wife and my other little children, and make them all

good. Oh do, my heavenly Father help my mother to give over swearing and

bad things. Thou canst do it. Do Thou bless my father, and my brothers,

and all my relations, and Mr. Smith in his work, and for being so good to

us, so that we may all meet in heaven, for Jesus Christ’s sake. Amen.

“Our Father which art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name, Thy kingdom come,

Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily

bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive them that trespass

against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

For Thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, for ever and ever.

Amen.”

After Clayton had dried his eyes we got up, to behold, over the top of

the bottom half of his van door, the riders, dressed in red, scarlet,

yellow, green, blue, crimson, and orange, with a deep _black shade_ to be

seen _underneath_, galloping to hell with hordes of gamblers at their

heels as fast as their poor, cruelly treated steeds could carry them, all

leaving footprints behind them for young beginners to follow. I said to

Clayton, “Are you not tired of this kind of life?” And he said he was.

“It is no good for anybody,” said Clayton, “and I am going to leave it.

This is my last day with the ‘cocoa-nuts.’ I shall start in the

morning—Saturday—for Coventry and Atherstone, where I mean to settle down

and bring my children up like other folks. I have taken a house and am

going to furnish it, and a gentleman is going to give me a chance of

learning a trade, for which I thank God.”

As the shouts of the hell-bound multitude were dying away, and the gains

and losses reckoned up, Clayton’s three little gipsy children, with their

lovely features, curls, and bright blue eyes, came toddling up the steps

to the van door, calling out, “Dad, let us in; dad, let us in.” The door

was opened, and the little dears comfortably seated by our side. I gave

them a few pictures, some coppers, stroked their hair, and “chucked their

chin,” and bade them good-bye in the midst of a shower of rain, to meet

again some day with the bright sun shining overhead and a clear sky

without a cloud to be seen anywhere. For the present I must say with

John Harris in his _Wayside Pictures_—

“Where Thou leadest it is best;

Cheer me with the thought of rest,

Till I gain the upper shore,

And my _tent_ is struck no more.”

Rambles among the Gipsies at Boughton Green Fair.

I HAD heard much and often about the Boughton Green Fair, and the vast

number of gipsies, semi-gipsies, and other tramps, scamps, vagabonds,

hawkers, farmers, tradesmen, the fast and loose, riff-raff and

respectable, gathered together from all quarters once a year upon this

ancient Green for a “fairing.” Tradesmen and farmers exhibited their

wares, live stock, and implements of husbandry; and others set forth

their articles of torture, things of fashion, painted faces,

“tomfoolery,” and “bosh,” to those who like to tramp thither in sunshine

and storm with plenty of money in their pockets for revel and debauch.

Bidding the sparrows, linnets, swallows, and wagtails, fluttering and

darting round our dwelling, good-bye as they were hopping, chirping,

twittering, and gathering a variety of materials upon which to build

their nests; and with my little folks at the door, I wended my way to the

station.

“Then he kissed his olive branches,

Bade his wife good-bye,

And said, . . .

‘Heaven preserve you all!’”

_Wayside Pictures_ (HARRIS).

The sun was shining warmly, the roads dusty, and a few red faces covered

with perspiration were to be seen panting along. Many of the men were

dressed in black cloth, a little faded, of the “cut” and fashion out of

date many years ago. Some had their coats hung upon their arm, with

white shirt sleeves and heavy boots everywhere visible. Most fairly

well-to-do farm labourers have for Sundays and mourning days a black

suit, which lasts them for many years. In some instances the father’s

black clothes become family “heirlooms”—at any rate, for a time—and then,

when the father dies, they are turned into garments for the little

children. Of course the father’s “black silk furred hat” cannot be made

less, and to pad it to make it fit little Johnny’s head is an awkward

process. I have seen many _little boys_ with big hats upon their heads

in my time. I suppose they have imagined that people would infer that

they had big heads under the hats with plenty of brain power. This is a

mistake. Big hats, with little brain and less common sense, and No. 10

rather high, often go together. Upon the road would be “Our Sal” with

her “chap,” and his brother Jim, yawning, shouting, and gaping along,

and, as my friends the boatmen would say, “a little beerish.” Some of

the country labouring girls would have their shawls upon their arms, and

they would be stalking along in their strong boots at the rate of four

miles an hour, frolicking and screaming as Bill Sands, Jack Jiggers, Joe

Straw, Matt Twist, and Ben Feeder jostled against them. They seemed to

delight in showing the tops of their boots, with crumpled and overhanging

stockings. There were other occupants of the road trudging limpingly

after the cows, sheep, horses, donkeys, and mules, called “tramps” and

“drovers,” who seemed to be, and really are, the “cast-offs” of society.

These poor mortals were, as a rule, either as thin as herrings or as

bloated as pigs, with faces red with beer-barrel paint; and they wore

gentlemen’s “cast-off” clothing in the last stages of consumption, with

rags flying in the wind. Their once high-heeled boots were nearly upside

down, while dirty toes, patches, and rag-stuffing were everywhere

visible.

In the train there was the usual jostle, bustle, and crush, and gossip.

At Northampton station there was no little commotion, owing to the

station-master having closed the station-yard against all cabs except

those who ply regularly between the station and the town.

One cabman came to me and said that he would take me to the Green for a

less fare than he charged others if I would get into his cab the first.

I asked him his reason. “Because,” he said, “if you get in first others

will follow, and I shall soon have a load.” I could not see the force of

his argument, and found my way to another cab. I had no sooner seated

myself than the cabman took off, or hid, his number. I asked him why he

did that. His answer was, “So that if I drive fast the Bobbies shan’t

catch the sight of my number. If they get my number and I am caught

driving fast there will be either thirty ‘bob’ for me to pay, or I shall

have to go to ‘quad’ for a fortnight.”

Some of the poor horses attached to the vehicles—cabs, waggonettes,

carriers carts, carriages—were heavily laden with human beings, till they

could scarcely crawl. Uphill, down dale, slashing, dashing, banging,

whipping, kicking, and shouting seemed to be the order of the day; and on

this vast mass of human and animal life poured—and myself among the

crowd—till I found we were fairly among the gipsies upon the Green.

Having partaken of a starvation lunch in one of the booths, consisting of

“reecy” fat ham, with a greasy knife and fork, dried bread and lettuce,

served upon plates not over clean, and studded and painted with patches

of mustard left by a former customer, and with warm ginger-beer as tame

as skim milk to take the place of champagne, I began to take stock of the

Green, which natural formation, together with those made apparently

hundreds of years ago, seemed to excite my first attention.

The large circular holes, of about thirty feet diameter and one foot

below the level of the surrounding ground, reminded me very much of

ancient gipsy encampments. Boughton Green has been a favourite annual

camping ground for generations, and may to-day be considered as the

fluctuating capital of gipsydom in the Midlands, where the gipsies from

all the Midland and many other counties do annually congregate to fight,

quarrel, brawl, pray, sing, rob, steal, cheat, and, in past times,

murder.

According to Wetton’s “Guide to Northamptonshire,” published some

fifty-six years ago, it seems probable that the fair was formerly set out

in canvas streets, after the manner of a maze, shepherd’s-race, or

labyrinth; and as Boughton Green was close to a Roman station, this seems

probable. This was the custom of the Roman fairs held close to their

stations. This much seems to be inferred from Baker’s “History of

Northamptonshire,” where he says, “The stretching canvas forms the gaudy

streets.”

In the _Northampton Mercury_, June 5, 1721, the following advertisement

appears: “The Right Hon. the Earl of Strafford has been pleased to give a

bat, value one guinea, to be played for on Monday at cudgels, and another

of the same price; and also 6 pairs of buckskin gloves at 5s. a pair, to

be wrestled for on Tuesday; and a silver cup of the value of 5 guineas

price to be run for on Wednesday by maiden galloways not exceeding 14

hands high, during the time of Boughton Fair. The ladies of the better

rank to meet to raffle, see the shows, and then to adjourn to a ball at

the Red Lion Inn, Northampton, in the evening.”

In Baker’s “History of Northamptonshire” the following poem appears

relative to the fair—

“From every part stretched o’er the sultry way,

The labouring team the various stores convey.

Vessels of wood and brass, all bright and new,

In merry mixture rise upon the view.

See! pots capacious lesser pots entomb,

And hogsheads barrels gorge for want of room;

From their broad base part in each other hid

The lessening tubs shoot up like a pyramid.

Pitchforks and axes and the deepening spade

Beneath the pressing load are harmless laid;

Whilst out behind, where pliant poles prevail,

The merry waggon seems to wag her tail.”

Looked at from rising ground, far in the distance and with a keen sense

for the picturesque and romantic, the moral and physical aspects of

nature, and love of liberty, which gipsy life presents to those few

unacquainted with its dark, degrading side—thank God, only a few—are food

for admiration and wonder; to others the objects of pity and suggestive

reflection. There can be no doubt that Cowper, the immortal poet, who

lived at Olney, a few miles from Boughton Green and Higham Ferrers, as he

was wont to take his daily walks, would often cross the path of the

Northamptonshire gipsies. Sometimes there would accompany him his two

lady friends who were jealous of each other’s influence—Lady Austin and

Mrs. Unwin. Occasionally Lady Hesketh and some of the Throckmortons

would be the cheerful companions in his despondency and gloom, and at

other times he would sally forth single-handed in quest of food for his

hares and leverets, in silent meditation upon the grand and beautiful

surroundings. It is more than probable that while he saw from the

beautiful elevation, a few miles outside Olney and Weston, the grey smoke

rising from the gipsy encampment in the distance silently and quietly

whirling, twirling, and ascending among the trees, to be lost among the

daisies and hedgerows, the muses danced before him and brought forth the

truthful, characteristic poem relating to gipsies—

“I see a column of slow rising smoke

O’ertop the lofty wood that skirts the wild.

A vagabond and useless tribe there eat

Their miserable meal. A kettle

Slung between two poles, upon a stick transverse

Receives the morsel; flesh _obscene_ hog

Or vermin; or at best of cock purloined

From his accustomed perch. Hard-faring race

They pick their fuel out of every hedge

Which, kindled with dry leaves and wood, just saves

The spark of life. The sportive wind blows wide

Their fluttering rags, and shows a tawny skin

The vellum of the pedigree they claim.”

The publication of this poem, and the fact that large numbers of gipsy

tramps were flitting about the country, with their wretched equipages,

may have been the means of stirring the kind hearts of Smith, Crabb,

Hoyland, William Allen, of Higham Ferrers, solicitor, and steward to Earl

Fitzwilliam, and many others, some eighty or one hundred years ago, to

try to reclaim the gipsies from their debasing habits and customs.

It has generally been supposed that the term “green,” given to the land

upon which the annual fair is held, comes to us at this date on account

of its greensward. This is an error. According to Baker’s and other

histories of Northamptonshire, Boughton Green derives its name and title

as follows. “In the time of Edward I., William de Nutricilla, abbot of

St. Wandegisile, conveyed the lands to John de Boketon or Boughton, from

whom they descended to Sir Thomas de Boketon his grandson, and who was

succeeded by Sir Henry Green his son and heir, who was Lord Chief Justice

of England.” Thus we see the probability of it being called at this

ancient date, on account of the close relationship existing between the

Boketon or Boughton and Green, Boughton and Green’s wake or fair. In

course of time the “and” has been dropped, and we have now “Boughton

Green fair.”

“Sir Henry Green obtained a grant or charter, dated 28th February, 1351

(25 of Edward III.), for an annual fair to be held on the manor for the

space of three days, beginning with the vigil of the nativity of St. John

the Baptist (June 23rd), and ending the day after it.” This being so,

the adding of “green” to the fair can be easily accounted for. The site

upon which the fair is held is seventeen acres.

Outside, and at the east end of the fair grounds, stands the remains of

what was once, no doubt, a fine old Gothic church, dedicated then, as the

new church in the village is now, to St. John the Baptist. The tower and

spire of the old church fell about a century ago upon a gipsy Smith and

his wife, whose sleeping quarters—instead of the gipsy tent—had been for

some time beneath its crumbling ruins. The old villagers will tell you,

with pride and pleasure upon their faces, that Boughton old church was,

before Cromwell destroyed it, one of the seven oldest churches in

England. Of course, this is a subject upon which I do not feel to be

“master of the situation.” Such was the odium attached to gipsies a

century ago, that it was not thought worthwhile to dig them out from

beneath the mass of ruins that had fallen upon them; and from the time

when the tower and spire fell, to the time when the crumbling refuse was

cleared away a few years since, the bones of poor gipsy Smith and his

wife had crumbled into dust and been scattered to the winds. It touches

a tender and sympathetic chord, and draws forth a scalding tear down

one’s face when one ponders over the many evenings the old gipsy couple

had enjoyed their frugal meal—maybe of hedgehogs and snails, or the piece

of a decaying pig—beneath the belfry, when the bells were pealing forth,

soft and low, as the shades of evening were gathering round them, and

they were preparing to rest their aimless and useless bones upon the

straw in their dark, at times musical, and at other times dismal, abode

among the dead. The churchyard and burial ground round the old church is

well fenced in, and kept in beautiful order. Several gipsies are buried

in the churchyard; but there is no stone to mark the exact spot. They

are pretty close to each other, so I am told, at the east end of the

church.

Close to the churchyard there is a spring of excellent water, called St.

John’s Spring. So highly did our forefathers value it, that it was

preserved specially as a rippling little fountain for supplying water for

the holy rite of baptism. When I saw it, gipsies, tramps, show people,

vagabonds, and all kinds of dirty and clean travellers, with their

wretched companions, steeds, and poor bony beasts of burden, were

quenching their thirst at this living stream, forcing its way out of the

hillside. It seemed, as I stood by, looking at the pails put under its

mouth for a filling, to force its way faster, and with greater gusto,

delight, and pleasure into the dirty pails, owned by dirty hands and

dirtier faces, whose filthy bodies were covered with stinking rags, than

into clean pails carried by white hands and lovely smiling faces peering

over them. One little dirty urchin put his mouth under it for “a drink.”

No sooner was this done, than the holy spring covered his unholy dirty

face with more clear water than he wanted, some of which found its way

down his bosom and into his breeches; at this he “sobbed,” and sobbed

right out that I could not help laughing. He turned up his piebald

watery face as if in anger at my laughing at him. I said to him, “What

is the matter with you?” “No—no—no—no—nought is the matter wi me. It’s

co—co—co—cold, and you woodner laugh if you were like me. It’s wet my

belly.”

The little fellow for once received a washing, contrary, no doubt, to his

wish. After he had dried his face with the ragged remains of a dirty

sleeve, he found his way back to the green—I expect his mother would

scarcely know him—and I went for a stroll down “Spectacle Lane,” where

gipsies formerly tented and camped in large numbers.

Down this pretty country lane there was a pleasant recess, a little

higher than the road, under the trees, evidently formed by the gipsies on

purpose to have their “tents high and dry.” Several tents could be

nicely sheltered and partly secluded under the trees in each recess.

Water and game would be plentiful in these lanes a century ago; in fact,

I should imagine such was the case now.

At the bottom of “Spectacle Lane” stood a large, fine, old Gothic

archway, called by the inhabitants in the neighbourhood “Spectacle

Tower.” The object and purpose for which it was built has never been

clearly made out. Judging from all the surrounding circumstances, it

appeared to me that it had at one time been intended as a gateway to a

mansion, abbey, or nunnery which has not been built; or, what is still

more probable, it may have been erected as a flag-tower for Fairfax’s

army on its way from Oxford through Northampton to the battle of Naseby,

and from thence to Leicester. Prince Rupert had gone as far as Daventry

to meet General Fairfax and his army, expecting, of course, that they

would come by Daventry; instead of which Fairfax left Daventry to the

left, and pushed on his way through Northampton and to Boughton Green,

hoping to arrive in Leicester before Prince Rupert and the King. Fairfax

may have expected that the memorable battle would have been fought in the

neighbourhood of Boughton; if so, he, at any rate, reckoned without his

host, as both armies came together at Naseby, and with what result any

schoolboy knows.

Report says that Boughton Green church was razed to the ground by

Cromwell’s army.

The fact of gipsies flocking to this, which was once a fine old Roman

Catholic church, and nestling in tents under its shadows, together with

the fact that old, monastic-looking farm-houses are to be seen in the

neighbourhood, confirms the idea I set forth in my “Gipsy Life,” p. 146,

viz., that on the gipsies landing in Scotland, about the year 1514, from

the continent, some of them hypocritically professed the Roman Catholic

faith in order to inveigle themselves into the good graces of the

nobility, so that their pockets and pouches might be filled with as

little trouble as possible; in fact, righteous gipsy Smith having come

from India, he knew well, and does so still, how to turn religious

sentiment to advantage, and hence he landed in Scotland from France as

above instead of Dover and London, and wended his way through the Midland

counties and southward; and hence we find Northamptonshire, in times

later on, a central camping ground for these lawless tribes of aimless

vagabonds.

About a century ago a number of gipsies were brought before the

magistrates at Northampton; upon what charge has not been stated. This

so enraged the gipsies upon Boughton Green and other parts of

Northamptonshire, that they threatened to set fire to the town of

Northampton. The end of it was that several of the gipsies, for their

riotous conduct, forfeited their lives upon the gallows. See “Gipsy

Life,” p. 154.

To come back to Boughton Green fair. After having wandered about

“Spectacle Lane” I called upon a gentleman, Mr. Jeys, who has resided for

many years close to the green, and he told me that he has seen as many as

forty to fifty tents and vans of gipsies camping in the lanes near to his

house. It was down this lane that small-pox raged among the gipsies.

Righteous Smith, with his two wives, Constant and Comfort, and a number

of their twenty children, died of small-pox. Births, deaths, and murders

have taken place upon the green. How many nobody knows, nor can any idea

be formed of the number. Mr. Jeys told me of one case, being a gipsy

row, ending in murder. Who had done it no one could tell, and where the

gipsy was buried was a mystery. They hunted and searched, but, like the

body of the Earl of Crauford and Balcarres, it could not be found, until

Mr. Jeys’ gardener came across it in the garden. When the body of the

gipsy was found it was laid straight out between two flag stones reared

edgewise, and a large flagstone as a covering. The arms were folded, and

upon the breast of the gipsy there was a pair of scissors, which had been

carefully placed there by those who had buried the gipsy in the dark; for

what purpose I cannot make out. Gipsies have queer notions about the

death and burial of those belonging to them. The old-fashioned gipsies

of bygone days, more than they do now, paid special regard to the dead,

and on this account they carried the dead body of the gipsy nearly half a

mile to bury it in a gentleman’s garden. The murdered gipsy in his

lifetime was, no doubt, a scissor-grinder, and the placing of the

scissors upon his breast was to remind them when he got to the other

country of what trade the gipsy was—_i.e._, if skulking about the country

with an old barrow grinding a few knives and scissors can be called a

trade.

A few years since a gentleman farmer belonging to the neighbourhood was

murdered upon the green, by whom it has never been found out. All sorts

of conjectures, suspicions, and surmises have taken place upon the

matter. Some say the gipsies did it; others say that some of the

unfortunate class had a hand in the sad affair. At any rate he was found

early next morning with his mouth crammed full of dust; his pockets were

empty, and his soul had gone into the unknown world. His name is

engraved upon the trunk of a tree close to the spot, which, owing to the

growth of the tree and the hand of time, is fast disappearing. The

greensward of Boughton Green is not a bed of roses; but, on the contrary,

I am afraid, those who have met their last enemy upon this battleground

of scamps have found it full of thorns—for such it has been to those who

have been murdered or met with death in doubtful company.

At the fair held in 1826, George Catherall, of Bolton, who was known as

Captain Slash, formed a large gang of about a hundred roughs—of whom it

was composed, young or old, it has not been stated, or whether any, and

how many of them, were gipsies—to rob and murder all upon the green on

the night of June 28th who would not “turn it up.” They formed

themselves, after being well primed with beer, into lines like soldiers,

and on they went to do their murderous, Satanic work, calling cut, “Blood

or money!” While they were carrying out their murderous designs, Captain

Slash would frequently cry out, “Now, my lads, form yourselves into line

soldier-like. Blood or money is what we want and what we shall have.”

Many of those who had retired for the night under canvas, or under their

stalls, were beaten, kicked, and not a few were rendered insensible.

There were no policemen in those days, and it was fortunate that a body

of shoemakers from Moulton were close at hand, or there would have been a

larger number of the hawkers and stall-keepers murdered, there is no

doubt. The Moulton shoemakers gave Slash and his gang what they did not

expect. Daybreak showed what a murderous night had been spent upon the

green. Blood, bludgeons, sticks, broken glass, tables, stools, were to

be seen lying in all directions. The money taken at the fair was hid in

all sorts of ways. The wife of a publican ran with her money all the way

to Northampton in her night-dress. A hawker of scythe-stones and

whetstones told me that he helped his father to put the money they had

taken during the fair under their cart-wheels. Others dug holes into the

turf with their knives; others hid their money in the hedge-bottom.

Scores were scampering about in their night-dresses in all directions,

with their hair on end, and almost frightened out of their senses, like

stark mad folks. The children nestling for the night under the carts,

tents, and in the booths, screeched and screamed about in the dark upon

the grass half naked, like a lot of young rabbits when the weasels have

been at their heels, horrible enough to frighten devils wild. The few

old folks visiting the fair every year who can remember the sad scene

talk of it at the present time with almost breathless silence. Some of

them said to me, “If we were to live a thousand years we should never

forget it.” Captain Slash was taken the next day to Northampton, and in

the end he was hung upon the new drop. Accounts differ as to how he met

his end. Some say that he died in sorrow and penitence. One gentleman

named F— told me that he was not far from him when he was hanged, and

walked close beside him on his way to the gallows. While jogging along

on the top of a cart Slash seemed quite jovial, and as merry as if going

to a wedding. He remarked that his mother had said to him more than once

that “he would die with his boots on,” but he would make her a liar for

once; and just before the fatal bolt was drawn he kicked his boots off

among the crowd, and one of them hit a woman who stood next to my friend

in the face and disfigured it. After this startling scene his nerves

gave way, and he dropped tremblingly into eternity. To-day the skeleton

of Captain Slash is to be seen in an asylum at Northampton as a warning

to all wrongdoers. One or two of his gang were transported, some cleared

out of the country, and the others got off “scot-free.”

The associations of bygone days of Boughton Green being disposed of, I

now began to ramble among the gipsies and others upon the green. I had

not gone far before I saw at the back of one of the vans a dirty,

greasy-looking tramp of a fellow, with an apron on that might have been

washed in boiling tallow and dried in smoke. In a large kettle before

him there was a quantity of thick yellow stuff—what it was composed of,

or how and by what means it was coloured, I could not tell—and by his

side, in an old basket, there were pieces of almost rotten fish casting

forth a sickly odour; and over a fire upon the ground there was an old

frying-pan partly full of hot grease. I was puzzled to know what this

was for, and what it all meant. I had not been puzzling long before I

saw the greasy tramp taking pieces of the fish out of his basket and dip

them into the thick yellow liquid; he then threw them into the pan upon

the fire, whereupon a crackling noise commenced. After turning and

twisting the pieces of fish about in the pan for some time, sometimes

with his fingers and at other times with a stick, they were “browned” in

order to be palatable to “greenhorns;” and as they were “cooked” he took

them out of the pan and put them into a basket, and sallied forth among

the throng and crush of “Johnnies,” calling out “Fine fish, fried and all

hot! Fried fish, all hot.” A crowd soon gathered round him, and with a

plentiful supply of pepper and vinegar he began business in earnest.

Well-dressed farmers, shoemakers, men, youths, girls, and maidens of

almost every grade clustered round him, and the eagerness with which they

clutched and enjoyed the fried fish, bones, and vinegar would have formed

a subject worthy of my friend Herbert Johnson, or W. H. Overend, the

artists of the “Graphic” and “Illustrated London News.” “Smack” went

their lips, and I turned away disgusted at the thought and sight at

having found so many simple, gullible beings in the world, standing ready

with open mouths to swallow the greasy morsels of dirty tramps. It is

pleasing to note that all those who live by frying fish, and also those

who live by eating it, are not of this stamp.

After strolling about for some time I turned among some of my old

friends, Jack, Jim, Bill, Sal, Righteous, Piety, and Zachriali, gipsies

of the cocoa-nut tribes engaged at cocoa-nut shying. All did not profess

to be so low down in the social scale as the gipsies. Poor “Pea-soup

Sal,” with a reddish face, who had imbibed a little too much from the

beer barrel, and whose legs were not over-strong, particularly objected

to being classed with the gipsies; in fact, as she propped herself up by

the side of her box of cocoa-nut balls, she turned up her nose, curled

her lip, and staggered at the idea of such “respectable people as they

wer-wer-wer-were being rec-rec-rec-reckoned with the gip-gip-gip-gipsies.

They are a ba-ba-ba-ba-bad lot.” Poor Sal was now overcome, and fell to

the ground. For once in her life she was at any rate level with those

gipsies who were squatting upon the floor. Her husband, who seemed to be

a common-sense sort of a man, and apparently fairly educated, came to her

relief. If he had not done so, I would not have given much for the

cocoa-nuts, and less still for poor unfortunate Sal.

At times, when business was slack, I entered lengthily into conversation

with him as to what had been the cause of his getting into such a

degrading position.

I learned from him that both he and his wife had received a good

education. The man by trade was a carpenter, and the woman a dressmaker;

but in an evil hour, instead of trusting to their own abilities, work,

and common sense, they had taken the wrong turning, and from that time to

the present they had been going down hill, and they could not tell how.

All they seemed to realize was that they thought they were nearly at the

bottom. Both have relations well off in the world; and both have the

respect for their family not to disgrace it by vaunting their condition

before the world, and making it known to their friends—only to a

privileged _few_—the disgraceful social condition to which they had

brought themselves. It is something heartrending, past description, to

see a good tradesman and his dressmaking wife fooling their time away in

idleness, wickedness, and sin, tramping the country, gambling with

cocoa-nuts, living in vans, eating garbage, and trafficking in poor

worn-out old horses and donkeys.

I found in further conversation with this unfortunate couple that gipsies

have invented fresh machinations to kill farmers’ pigs, viz., to take the

inside of an apple out and fill it with mustard; and as the women or

children are going up to the farm-houses some of the apples stuffed with

mustard are thrown among the pigs—pigs are fond of apples—and the

consequence is the large quantity of mustard in the apple suffocates the

pigs, and nobody, except the gipsies, know how it has been done. Some

other members of the gang will visit the farm-house during the next day

or two, under the pretext of buying up old dead carcases, out of which to

render all the fat to make cart grease. The farmer replies, “Oh yes, we

had a pig,”—or a cow, as the case may be—“died yesterday. You can have

that for five shillings if you like to dig it. You will find it in the

meadow next to the piggery.” “All right, guvernor, here’s the money.”

Of course the gipsies fetch it, and it forms a relish for them for a long

time. I have known of cases where the pig has been buried for five days,

being unearthed, and turned into food for the big and little gipsies.

Mr. T— also told me how cows, calves, and bullocks are treated by the

gipsies—the consequence is they are found dead the next morning in the

fields—viz., two or three of the men will take a handful of hay and a

rope, and when they have caught the cow, they will make it secure, and

then the hay is forced into its throat, and a rope tied and twisted

tightly round its mouth. When suffocation has completed its work, the

hay is drawn out of its throat, and the nostrils are wiped clean. The

gipsies then set off to their camp again. In a couple of days or so,

according to a pre-arranged plan, some of the gang call upon the farmers

to buy any dead cattle or pigs they may have to sell, and the result is,

as in the case of the pigs suffocated with the mustard in the apples, the

cow, calf, or bullock is taken to their tents or vans, perhaps a few

miles away, and divided among the gipsies.

Some of the gipsies get a living by selling cart grease, which they say

is pure fat, but which in reality is made up principally of potatoes,

yellow turnips, and grease.

The gipsies have found out that “shot” is not so good to cure a

broken-winded horse for one day only, as butter or lard—butter is

preferable. The way they do it is to let the horse fast overnight, and

then early next morning force a pound of butter down its throat. To cure

a “roarer” a pint of oil is given overnight upon an empty stomach.

The earnings of cocoa-nut gamblers and others of the same class vary very

much. Mr. T— told me that he and his wife went upon Northampton

racecourse last races with only five shillings in their pockets, with

which they bought some acids, juices, and scents; these, with plenty of

water, they turned into “pine-apple champagne,” and the result was they

made five pounds profit, and plenty to eat and drink, with a

“jollification” into the bargain, the whole of which was spent in a

fortnight, and they had to commence again, sadder but no wiser.

It is an error to say that gipsies do not rob each other; some of them

have told me that they have been robbed fearfully by other gipsies,

sometimes of as many as a hundred cocoa-nuts at a time.

While our conversation was going on some silly beings were knocking their

heads against a boss, for which honour they paid their pennies. What a

satire upon the fair, I thought. Thousands were running their heads

against bosses more deadly in effect than the spring bosses at which they

ran like fighting rams. I was not much afraid of the heads of the

bossers giving way, my only fear was for their necks.

Behind me there was to be seen another crowd shooting at glass bottles in

the air. These might be said to be “windy customers,” and as a rule they

were full of “gas,” bombast, thin and showy; while those who faced the

“boss” were thick-necked, with plenty of animalism about them, and ready

for a row.

I did not see many gaudily and showily dressed gipsy girls at the fair,

but I saw a large number of gipsy girls dressed as “farming girls,”

“farmers’ daughters,” and servants, at work among the easy-going chaps.

Some of the girls—or, I should say, women—held the hands of the “silly”

in their hands, and they were pleasantly looking at the lucky lines with

one eye, and bewitchingly into their faces with the other, while they

told the geese their fortunes, and the pleasures and troubles they would

have on account of “dark ladies” and “fair ladies,” against whom they

were to be on their guard, or they would not marry the one they loved.

In some cases “dark gentlemen” were trying to steal the affections of

their young lady. As a rule gipsies prognosticate evil from “fair

ladies” or “fair gentlemen.” Of course it would not do to be too heavy

upon the “dark gentlemen” or “dark ladies.” A number of “shoe girls”

were having their fortunes told also.

One of the gipsies had offended a man close to me from some cause or

other, which had the effect of exasperating the “beery” man to such an

extent that he bawled out, “You might rake hell out and scratch among the

cinders, and you would not find a worse lot than gipsies.” “Hold, hold,”

I said; “many of them are bad, at the same time you will find some

good-hearted folks among them, a few of whom I know.” I now turned and

had a long conversation with a gipsy from Kent, and the good woman with

her husband both fell in with my idea of getting the gipsy children

educated by means of a free pass book, and of having their vans

registered. Although busy with the evening meal, it did not prevent her

entering heartily and pleasantly into my plans for effecting an

improvement in the condition of the gipsies and their children, and more

than once, surrounded as she was with everything the opposite of

heavenly, said, “Thank you, sir, thank you, sir; and may God bless you

for your efforts to improve the gipsies.” I told her that all the

gipsies were not so kindly disposed as to wish me success. “Never mind

them, sir; all the right-thinking gipsies will say so.” “You have spoken

the truth,” I said; “before you can apply a remedy to a festering sore

the proper thing to do is to probe it to the bottom, and this I have been

trying for a long time to do.” It is a thousand times better to get at

the root of a sore than to plaster it over by misleading fiction and

romance, as some masculine writers, fascinated by the artificial charms

of gipsy beauties—so called—have been doing. In this late day such

efforts to hoodwink thoughtful, loyal, and observing men, and others who

have the welfare of the nation at heart, may well be compared to a man

sticking a beautiful French butterfly upon a dead ox, and then going

among a crowd of bystanders with a glib tongue, and cap in hand, trying

to make them believe that the rotten dead ox was a mass of beautiful

butterflies, which only required a shower of coppers and praises to cause

them to fly.

No wonder at stable-boys and quacks, the sons of ministers, and others,

becoming bewitched to the extent of having to face the frowns of friends

on account of their gipsy-poaching proclivities.

My process may have been sharp and painful, and probably it is so now,

but it will be found effective, enduring, and pleasing in the end. To

deal with the evils of gipsying in a manner to excite the worst side of

human nature may be pleasing for the present, but it will bring remorse

and rottenness which no amount of misleading romance and pleasingly

painted sin will be able to cover.

During the day I was informed by the gipsies that one young farmer had

spent fifteen shillings in bowling for cocoa-nuts, and a youth not more

than fourteen years old had spent five shillings similarly; this being

so, it is not to be wondered at that our present-day gipsies should be on

the increase at the rate they are. With fair weather, nuts cheap,

cricketers out of the way, and “plenty of young uns,” it is a “roaring

trade.”

When questioning one gipsy woman as to how many of the gipsies upon the

ground could read and write—I roughly calculated the number of gipsies to

be over a hundred men and women, and a hundred and fifty children—she

answered me as follows: “Lord bless you, my dear good gentleman, I do not

know more than three upon the green who can read and write. It would be

a blessed thing if they could; but that will never be, as nobody takes

any interest in us gipsies.”

It was tearfully sorrowful to see over a hundred and fifty children

squatting about in bogs, dirt, filth, excitement, iniquity, and

double-dyeing sin, groping their way to wretchedness and misery, without

any hand being put out to save them.

So far as I could gather, not half a dozen of these gangs of un-English,

lawless tramps and travellers had ever been in either day or Sunday

school. And our civilizing “State” has not taken any steps for bringing

the gipsy and other travelling children under school influence.

“Now, my lads, bowl away! All bad nuts returned; bowl away! Try your

luck now, my young gentlemen; try your luck; bowl away!” Bang went a

cocoa-nut off one of the stilts, flying in all directions, with the oil

scattered to the winds. One thing has often surprised me, that the

gipsies have not had frequently to carry cracked skulls, for some of the

roguish “farmer chaps” seem to delight more in bowling at the gipsies’

heads than the cocoa-nuts at their feet. It is their quick-sightedness

and dexterous movements that save them. No drone would do to be at the

back of the “pegs,” or he would have to look out for his “pins.”

A little farther ahead there was a family of gipsies of the name of

Smith, man, wife, and seven children, squatting upon the ground to take

their evening meal. As soon as they saw me they heartily invited me to

join them. Gipsies never invite any one to partake of a meal with them

unless with the whole heart. They never ask you with their mouths to

join them and in their hearts hope you will not. This is one of the

favourable traits in their character. For a man they love they would rob

a hen-roost to fill his belly, and they would spit in the face of the man

they hate. When you are eating with them, or, in fact, doing anything

with them, you must be as one of them, or you will have to look out for

“squalls.” They can bear and respect the man or woman who, as a friend,

speaks openly and plainly to them, but they will be down upon the man

“like a load of bricks” who tries by cunning and craft to get “the best

side of them.”

At the first interview they suspect that every stranger has some design

upon them, and, as a consequence of ignorance and suspicion, they appear

to be sullen and reserved. This feature of gipsy life wears off as they

find out that you are a friend to them.

I accepted their invitation to tea in the midst of cocoa-nut

establishments, steam horses, screeching of the whistles, horrifying

music of a “hurdy-gurdy” organ, swing boats, and the screams of giddy

girls and larking chaps, trotting donkeys, the galloping of “roaring

horses and broken-winded ponies,” whose riders were half drunk and mad

with rage, beating, kicking, slashing, swearing, and banging, till both

the poor animals and their riders foamed at their mouths like mad dogs.

The old china was fetched up for me, which, Mrs. Smith said, was over a

hundred years old. A good cup of tea was poured out, the thin bread and

butter cut and laid upon a clean cloth, and I was just about to sit upon

an old piece of dirty flannel that lay upon the grass—for the grass was

at this time getting a little damp—when the good woman cried out, loud

enough to shake one’s nerves, “My dear good gentleman, you must not sit

down upon that.” “No, no,” Smith, the ungracious-nosed gipsy cried out

in a voice as loud as his wife’s. “If you do you’ll get more than you

bargained for. It’s all alive, don’t you see it?” Mrs. Smith saw that I

was anxious to change quarters to the other side of the tent, and

apologized for the filthy rag being there, by saying that “one of the

children from one of the other vans had brought it, and had not taken it

back again.” We were now seated, and I was enjoying my tea as well as I

could—they said that “they hoped that I should look upon the tea as a

fairing,” and as such I looked upon it and enjoyed it, for I was both

hungry and thirsty—when a Northampton baker appeared upon the scene

vending his bread. A little pleasantry was exchanged between the

bread-seller, the gipsies, and myself about the size of the loaves, the

dearness of the bread, and what was put into the flour before baking to

make the loaves white, large, and showy. The conversation turned upon

potatoes and alum, and the gipsy Smith discussed the quantity of potato

and alum there was in the bread the baker had sold to them. This nettled

the baker, and he said, “Bread mixed with potatoes and alum was good

enough for pigs, but it—” The gipsy would not let him finish his

sentence, but instantly sprang to his feet, and ran at the baker, and

struck him on the breast with his tightened fist, calling out, “Do you

mean to say that bread mixed with potatoes is good enough for pigs, and

do you call us pigs? You reckon us as pigs, do you? You shall remember

this or I am not Righteous Gipsy Smith.” And just as he was running at

the half-frightened baker again Mrs. Smith stepped between them. An

altercation took place, one of the most disgusting and sickening I ever

knew. The baker’s wife now came up, and for a few minutes there was such

a storm over the pot as I had never seen in my life. It bid fair to

become a general _melée_. I was called in to decide who was in the

wrong. This was no little difficulty, as the gipsy was excited by beer,

and the baker by rage and fear. The end of it was I calmed them both

down. The baker and his wife sped their way to Northampton, and the

gipsy to the back of his van, to vent his bile and calm his passion,

after which we sat down to finish our tea. This being over, and calm,

peace, and quietness reigning, I gave the children some coppers and shook

hands warmly with the gipsies, and thanked them, and then turned to

another phase of gipsy life.

I began to think that it was quite time to look after my lodging for the

night, and wended my way to Boughton village, some half-mile or more

away. This was a work of no light undertaking. I first tried to find a

clean bed in a quiet cottage, which, after tramping about from house to

house, knocking, inquiring, had to be given up as impossible. The poor

folks eyed me over from head to foot with wondering curiosity. They

seemed to be puzzled as to my movements, and as to whether they should

reckon me as a gentleman, or a bailiff, who had secreted in my pockets

either a county-court summons or an execution. I next tried the

“publicans and sinners.” At first they hesitated about giving me an

answer; especially the innkeeper at the “Griffin.” They seemed to wonder

whether I was or was not a parson, spying out the land. The landlady at

the “Red Lion” was holding out encouragement, until the landlord, who

might be made of vinegar and crabs, appeared upon the scene, calling out

gruffly, “No, we can’t do wi anybodys;” and out I went, expecting to have

a stone for my pillow under some wall or hedge-bottom upon the green.

Fortunately I called at a cottage on the roadside, about a hundred and

fifty yards from the green, to see if they could oblige me with a bed.

After a minute’s hesitation, the good woman, who seemed to have a large

heart and a good-natured face, said, “Yes, you look to be a gentleman,

and we will try to accommodate you. Come in and make yourself at home.

Will you have some tea?”

After a rest for a few minutes, and as the shades of evening were

gathering round, I strolled upon the “green” and found Bacchus was on his

throne with Atè, Discordia, Momus, and Mars as his attendants.

Concordia, Harpocrates, and Pudicitia had not been upon the “green,” or,

if so, they had been only for a very short time. Broken glasses, empty

beer barrels, corks, pieces of paper, and stools upside down were to be

seen on every hand. The perfume of burning paraffin, aroma of the beer

barrel, and stench of the brandy bottle met me at every turn as I wended

my way among the wicked, silly, larking, and foolish. Here and there

could be seen girls scarcely in their teens, with the arms of half-drunk

“chaps” round their waists—upon the table before them were “jugs of

beer”—and opening their mouths wide as if they would be delighted at any

one looking down their throats as they bawled out most disgusting songs.

In one of the booths between forty and fifty boys and girls were larking

together in a manner that made one shudder to think of the results. Some

of them were threatening vengeance to their “Bills,” “Jacks,” or “Toms,”

if they said a word to them when they got home.

One of the women struck up, as if she was determined to contribute her

share to the debauch, in squeaking tones resembling that of a cracked tin

whistle—

“We won’t go home till morning,

Till daylight does appear.”

A little ahead a rustle, commotion, and hubbub was going on; of course I

must join in the crush. I could not get very near. When I inquired what

was the matter, I was coolly told that “it was only a man and woman

fight.” Thanks to the excellent body of policemen at hand, it was soon

stopped. Another “turn” in the distance was taking place. A gipsy—a

big, cowardly, hulking fellow—and an Englishman had long had a grudge

against each other. The Englishman could not get the cowardly gipsy to

“fight it out.” At last the Englishman offered the gipsy half a crown

and a gallon of beer to let him have one “round” with him. The gipsy

consented to this condition. The money was paid and the beer drunk,

after which the gipsy wanted to back out of the bargain. Before the big

gipsy would at the last minute undertake to fight the little Englishman,

the gipsy stipulated that there was to be “no hitting upon the noses.”

The Englishman did not like this shuffling, but he agreed to it, and they

stripped for the encounter. For a few minutes they sparred about until

the gipsy saw his opportunity to hit the Englishman full tilt upon his

nose, which he did with a tremendous force sufficient to break it. When

the gipsy was asked why he did it, he said, “I could not help it, my hand

slipped.” A little farther on still, I came upon a policeman rolling an

empty beer barrel from the policemen’s tent towards the beer stores.

[Picture: The “sweets” and “sours” of Gipsy modern life]

During the day I did not observe one “blue ribbon” policeman upon the

grounds—nor, in fact, did I see one upon the course. No doubt there were

many good and true men and women upon the “green” who had gone there

purposely to sell their wares. Would to God that there had been more of

them, and then there would have been less rows, and less cause for such a

body of policemen. The pure gipsy rows—_i.e._, a number of gipsies

joining in a general _melée_ of an “up-and-down fight,” paying off old

scores—were less this year than they have been known for a long time.

Several times a row was imminent, but with a little tact and the common

sense of the women—aye, and of the men too—it was averted. I observed a

little more sulkiness than usual on the part of a few of the gipsies, but

with a little pleasantry this passed off.

I retired from the hubbub for a few minutes, to stand against one of the

huge trees growing upon the edge of the “green,” and while there I heard

some gipsies chuckling over the “gingered” and “screwed” horses and

ponies they had sold during the fair, and arranging which of their party

should hunt the customer out the next day, to buy back for a five-pound

note their palmed-off “broken-winded” and “roaring old screws” which they

had sold for seventeen pound or twenty pound during the fair. A

fine-looking broken-winded horse, “roarer” or “cribber,” with the mark

intact, is almost a fortune for a gipsy. During two or three years

“while he will go,” the “screw” is sold and bought in again scores of

times. Many of the horse-dealing gipsies are dressed nowadays as

farmers, and by these means they more readily palm off their “screws”

upon young beginning town or street hawkers, carriers, and higglers.

Living in some of the vans of gipsies there were man, woman, and, in some

instances, seven or eight sons and daughters of all ages. In other vans

and tents there was a mixture of men, women, and children, not of the

same blood relationship; and the same may be said of some of the

travelling gingerbread hawkers.

Those of the hawkers who were rich enough to own a van slept in it

“higgledy-piggledy,” “pell-mell,” and “all of a heap.” Those who had not

vans, the men, women, and “chaps” slept upon the ground, under the stall

boards, in a manner which would be a disgrace to South African

civilization and Zulu morals.

In the midst of waning twilight and the gathering of sheets and rents,

some of the gipsy women were preparing for their last meal before

shutting the van doors and drawing to their tent curtains. Scores of

poor little lost, dirty, ignorant, neglected, and almost naked, gipsy

children gathered round me for “coppers” and “sweets.” After digging

deep into my pocket for all I could find, and distributing them among the

children, I bade the gipsy parents “good-night” and a “good-bye,” and

then turned to have a chat and a “good-night” with George Bagworth, the

steam-horse driver, and his wife, the “popgun” firer. George was dressed

in his best large Scotch plaid suit from head to foot. His “hurdy-gurdy

steam organ,” and “flying horses,” had winged married and single, men,

women, and children, round and round, exhibiting their thick and thin

legs, not modestly for the riders, but successfully for George and his

sharp, good-looking, business wife. George was in good humour with

himself and everybody else. He entered freely into conversation about

his troubles and trials in former years, and of his successes, position,

and future views.

He is very good to poor cocoa-nut gamblers. It often happens that some

of the poor unfortunate fraternity arrive upon the “course,” “green,” or

“fair” without a “tanner.” A wink of his wife’s eye prompts George to

advance them sufficient money to give them a start. This—for there is

honour among thieves—is paid back at the close of the fair, with many

thanks. George pointed out to me again with pride the vans he had made,

and with little greater pride to his artistic painting of the heathen

gods and goddesses, which were the mainstays of his whirligig

establishment.

George’s wife hung down her head at the non-success of her “popgun”

galleries. “But it is no use ‘frettin’ and cryin’ over spilt milk,’” she

said, while preparing their supper tea. “You’ll join us, won’t you, sir?

you shall be made right welcome, and have the best we’ve got.” They

fetched out their best antique china cup and saucer, and we three sat

down to a box table with cloth cover to enjoy the twilight meal, with the

twinkling stars overhead, and the gipsies’ lurcher dogs prowling about

the tents and vans, snuffling and smelling after the odds and ends and

other trifles. Speaking within compass, I should think there would not

be fewer than thirty lurchers skulking under the stalls as eagerly as if

after hares and rabbits. Of course George Bagworth’s joined in the scent

and sniffle. “Mine host” was a poacher bred and born—at least he had a

spell of it in his younger days among the woods, parks, spinnies, and

plantations joining Leicestershire and Staffordshire coalfields. The

twinkling star repast was finished; hubbub, din, screeching, yelling,

fighting, singing, shouting, swearing, blaspheming, and loud oaths were

dying out. Pluto seemed to be getting tired of his feast; Somnus was

observed stealthily wending his way among Bacchus’s wounded followers,

and the vast herds and tribes of poor, neglected, uneducated, and lost

little children living in sin, pestilential, and vitiated atmosphere with

dark—very dark—and black future before them, which the rising of a

morning’s sun could not dispel.

As I wended my way to my lodgings I could not help thinking of

Sennacherib’s army besieging Jerusalem with no Hezekiah to deliver.

I had now found my way to my lodgings. Round the family table in the

cottage there were Mr. and Mrs. Gayton, “mine host and hostess,” and one

or two friends. While the conversation was going on a party of drunken

fellows were bawling out down the road some kind of song, which I could

not comprehend. Mr. Gayton’s sister said it was a song she knew well;

and with a little persuasion—notwithstanding Mrs. Gayton’s twitching,

nervous manner and disinclination to hear it—the good woman struck up in

a sweet but rather shrill voice, and in somewhat affecting tremulous

tone, the song, as follows:

“Little empty cradle, treasured so with care,

Tho’ thy precious burden now has fled,

How we miss the locks of curly golden hair,

Peeping from the tiny snow-white bed.

When the dimpled cheeks and pretty laughing eyes,

From the rumpled pillows shone,

Then I gazed with gladness, now I looked with sighs,

Empty is the cradle—baby’s gone.

“Baby left her cradle for the golden shore,

O’er the silvery waters she has flown,

Gone to join the angels, peaceful evermore,

Empty is the cradle—baby’s gone.”

After the first verse was ended I noticed again a little subdued and

stifled sobbing, and the mistress of the house wiping her eyes with the

corner of her apron.

I could see that there was some cause for the tear-fetching tenderness

and sympathy that was manifested, and I gently asked for information, and

was told by the good people that during the last month two of the

youngest babies had been sent for to live in the angel-world where no

tears are seen and sighing heard. A melting, sorrowful sadness seemed to

creep over me as I looked round the room. A parent cannot describe the

feelings, and no one but a parent can feel them.

The cradle was empty in the corner; the lovely little birds had flown to

sing in a lovelier clime. The tender-hearted mother gave way to a

woman’s dewy feelings while another verse was sung, in which I could not

help joining, owing to having passed through similar circumstances. I

had lost more than one little tender lamb, and could enter feelingly into

the motherly woman’s misfortunes. I said the children were not lost but

gone before, where there are neither tears nor the pinchings of poverty.

In the midst of the solemn scene I wended my way upstairs to my humble

cot; my softened feelings, wet eyes, and scalding tears prevented me

worshipping Morpheus till just as the candle was flickering out in the

socket.

I then dropped into a dozing sleep to awake at opening day, after which I

bade my friends the gipsies good-bye, and left “the mother bending o’er

her beauty buds.”

Rambles among the Gipsies at St. Giles’ Fair, Oxford.

ON Saturday, September 4th, 1882, I found myself travelling southward by

the aid of a carrier’s waggon and first, second, and third class railway

carriages, surrounded by gentlemen, clergymen, tradesmen, farmers,

cattle-dealers, labourers, soldiers, snobs, fops, and scamps, and ladies

fat and thin, pretty, plain, reserved, lovable, and smiling; and as we

neared London the sleeping, yawning, gaping, and slow movements seemed to

be giving way to activity, bustle, restlessness, and anxious looks.

Stopping, banging, and dashing, and on we sped. In the train I had a

pleasant chat with the Rev. Mr. Gibbotson, vicar of Braunston, who

related to me some of his experiences with canal-boat children and the

gipsies. In one instance a gipsy charged him three shillings and

sixpence for grinding his nail scissors; and in another instance a sharp,

clever boat boy of twelve had passed the sixth standard, and was in a

fair way of becoming a pupil teacher, but in six months spent among the

canal children in floating up and down the country, he had learnt some of

their wicked and bad habits, which had ruined his career. After changing

carriages, I saw at one of the North London stations a woman, who must

have imagined that she was in the country, creeping out of one of the

compartments with her sweet-looking child of some four or five summers at

snail speed, and as if changing would have done to-morrow. She quietly

found her way to the carriage door and opened it very gently, and was

about to step leisurely upon the platform when the train began to move

off. Her eyes were now opened, and with a wild stare she tumbled the

child upon the platform, and then in getting out herself she fell upon

the footboard. Fortunately for herself and the child, the guard was

close by at the time, and with the quickness of lightning he seized the

child with one hand and its mother with the other and pulled them upon

the platform, the child upon its face and the mother upon her back, and

saved their lives in less time than I could twinkle my eye. The child

cried, the mother screamed, and the last I saw of them, as we were

rounding the curve, was that a porter was picking up the child, and the

bewildered mother was gathering herself together as well as she could.

[Picture: “On the road” to Oxford Fair]

On my way I called at a large block of new mansions in course of

erection, and which my son had in hand, and found a joke very nearly

carried into tragical and awful effect. The “lift” was not working well,

and a gentleman not of a classical or ministerial kind, rather than use

his legs in going up the ordinary stairs, preferred using the temporary

goods hoist, and said to one of the men as he was jumping into the cage

against the wish of friends, “Jump in, and if we must go to hell, we may

as well go together.” They had no sooner landed at the top of the

building and just cleared the cage, than it dropped to the bottom of the

building with terrific force, carrying destruction with it. One minute

longer and they would both have been in eternity.

Having fairly landed in London, I made my way to the Religious Tract

Society, and the Wesleyan Sunday-school Union, for some pictures, and

books, and magazines for the gipsy children, which were gladly given to

me, and with my bundles, bags, &c., I turned into my lodging in Museum

Street well tired. Overnight I inquired of my host if I could get a ’bus

or a cab that would take me to Paddington by nine o’clock on Sunday

morning. At this question he shook his head and said, “The ’busses will

not be running so early as eight o’clock, and the cabs, what few you will

meet, will be on their way home; therefore you will have a difficulty in

getting your packages to the station. And if you order one overnight it

is ten to one if they will come.” From this answer I could see that my

only course was to be up early enough to lug them to the station myself.

Six o’clock on Sunday morning found me getting a cup of cold tea and a

sandwich for my breakfast, after which I started down Oxford Street with

my four parcels, weighing about three-quarters of a hundredweight. No

’busses were to be seen. Here and there were tired, straggling cabmen

wending their way home. As I hailed them they shook their heads and on

they went. I managed to carry my load about two hundred yards, and then

turned off the street to rest, and to leave the few stragglers moving

about Oxford Street wondering as to my movements. Not far from Tottenham

Court Road I turned off the main street a few yards, and stood with my

back to the solitary passers-by, putting a few notes into my pocket-book,

when I was startled and somewhat surprised to find two tall young men at

my elbow, and without a word one of them deposited upon the Religious

Tract Society’s parcel a small book, entitled “A Cure for the Incurable,”

which I picked up and read as follows:

“During the journey we were joined by a young man and woman, the

latter evidently labouring under some distressing bodily infirmity.

The young man took advantage of the vacated scats to place his

afflicted companion in a recumbent position, carefully covering her

feet with a shawl. I gently alluded to her appearing unwell. ‘Yes,

ma’am,’ she replied, ‘I am just dismissed from St. Thomas’s Hospital

as _incurable_.’ The tone of her voice, and the tear which trickled

down her pale cheek, instantly awakened my sympathy. Her four

children, one a baby, and her dear husband, she said, made it ‘hard

to die;’ but she believed God would care for the motherless ones, and

cheer the lonely widower. ‘The doctors,’ she added, ‘say I may live

some months, but that cure is impossible. So I thought I would

rather be in my own cottage, where I could look at my children, and

see the flowers outside my door, and have fresh air, than remain in

the hospital; though I had everything of the best there, and great

kindness shown me. But, ma’am, home is home; and my husband knows

how to nurse me better than any one else. I know that I shall not

live long; but I shall die at home, and God will comfort my dear

husband, and will go through the dark valley with me.’ This brief

interview was deeply touching to me, and my tears flowed with

theirs.”

Just as I had finished the hasty glance through the little book, and was

preparing for another “move on,” I noticed a tall, emaciated, half-clad

young woman approaching me from the opposite side of the street. Such a

picture of misery I have rarely seen. She did not seem to have more than

one loosely-hung old garment upon her, which, as she walked, revealed the

shape of her figure, which did not at all seem a bad one; moral

deformities had not as yet, to all appearance, begun to tell heavily upon

her frame. On presenting herself to me she said, in tones of despair,

“Will you please give me sufficient to buy me a cup of coffee? I want it

very bad, I can assure you, sir. Do, dear sir.” Her eyes were red

either with drink, tears, or anguish. Poor lost soul! thought I; and on

she went to ruin and death.

I started again, and had got nearly to Oxford Circus, and deposited my

parcels upon the pavement, and was surveying things over in my mind, when

I heard something chirping over my head. I could not tell where the

sound came from. It was not crying, nor was it either singing or

moaning. My curiosity was set at rest as I lifted up my head to look

above. To my surprise, a young woman with lovely face, and head studded

with “curling bobs,” was peeping out of one of the top bedroom windows

and delightfully engaged in throwing kisses at somebody across the

street. “Chirp,” “chirp,” “chirp,” owing to the stillness of the

morning, sounded as distinctly as if they were near to me; at any rate

the kisses were not for me, and on I trudged. As I passed Holles Street,

people, young and old, with books under their arms and in their hands,

were going to early Sunday morning prayer-meetings, or other religious

services. What a contrast to a gathering of half-drunken hulking youths

and men tumbling and quarrelling about Gilbert Street, I thought. After

receiving not a few insults, I moved forward by stages till I arrived at

the Marble Arch, about eight o’clock, with my face covered with

perspiration, and my hands, arms, and shoulders tingling and aching with

a kind of deadness and shooting pains. Scavenger carts were moving to

and fro, carrying the filth and off-scouring of all nations. A coffee

stall seemed to have been doing a good business, if the pell-mell

gathering, sauntering array might be taken as a specimen of the quantity

and quality of the coffee drinkers, who might be called the loitering

customers of the “pub” in search of more substantial beverage than gin

and beer. Near Southwick Crescent and Oxford Square I passed another

coffee stall, more respectable in appearance than the one at Marble Arch,

upon which was painted in large letters, “The Church of England

Temperance Society.” I now began to try to make a further move, when a

cabman hailed in sight, who looked as if he were going on the stand

instead of coming off it. A bargain was struck, and he bowled me off at

a rattling pace to the Great Western station, where I arrived about

twenty minutes past eight o’clock, stiff and tired about my legs and

arms. In pacing backwards and forwards upon the platform, I nudged,

accidentally, the elbow of a porter who was taking his “swig” at a

passenger’s whiskey bottle. Whether the neck of the bottle tilted

against his teeth, or some of its contents went down his bosom instead of

his throat, I could not tell. He did not say much about the accident,

but his looks were “awful,” and my begging pardon could not turn them

into a smile. Another porter said, “They could do without Sunday

travelling if it were not for the London beer-drinkers. Shut up

beershops and you will gag Sunday trains.”

Some thirty or forty city fishermen, with their rods and tins, were

moving backwards and forwards waiting for the train; they were evidently

going out for a spree. One round jolly-faced, good-looking porter said

to me, “They are going out a-fishing, but it’s not many fish they catch.

They catch something they don’t expect sometimes. They are not all fish

that comes to their lines. ‘Many of the city fishermen gets a line and a

tin, and goes into the country and calls themselves travellers, and turns

into the first ‘pub’ they come to and then they booze all God’s day away,

and keep us poor chaps at work all Sunday instead of going to church or

chapel. Sunday travelling ought to be done away with; at any rate there

ought only to be two trains a day each way, out and into London.” A

porter then cried out, “Take your places for Slough, Reading, and

Oxford.” I obeyed his call, and found myself sitting opposite an old

friend, Mr. J. Seaman, from the _Weekly Times_. In the train the brandy

bottle was pulled out by a man whose nose apparently had been too

prominent upon his pugilistic-looking face at times for somebody’s

bruising machine; at any rate there was an indent in it upon which cock

robin could have sat very comfortably for an hour piping forth the curses

of drink and its consequences, and the blessing of God’s Sabbath as a day

of rest for man and beast.

In another corner was a young woman, dispensing liberally port wine to

her new and old friends around her, bringing to the faces of some of them

the alternate red blush and pale white, indicating that some monster was

at work within them, telling them that it was wrongdoing. After a three

hours’ pleasant chat on this bright summer’s morning, with my friend, I

arrived at Oxford. After partaking of a cold lunch, I made my way with

my arms full of pictures, books, and illustrated tracts, to the two

hundred vans and covered carts outside Oxford, near Somers Town. By the

time I had arrived the rain had begun to come down heavily. In wending

my way among the nearly two-mile length of vans, shows, covered carts,

and waggons, I found some old faces who gladly welcomed me. The road was

little better than a puddle. Thousands of Oxonians were running to and

fro, star-gazing, gossiping, laughing, shouting, and making fun on the

roadside. With a vast number of them Sunday seemed as on other days.

Little stalls of nuts, apples, plums, were on the footpaths.

Notwithstanding the pouring rain, the poor little dirty gipsy children

clustered round me in the vans and out of them for the pictures, books,

&c. Poor lost souls! some of them, old and young, big and little, men

and women, might not have been washed for months. Some of the

“hobbledehoys, betwixt men and boys,” of Oxford tried to make as big

fools of themselves as they could, and kept shouting out, “Now, governor,

they will swallow your bag if you will give it ’em.” Some of the town’s

children admired my pretty books, and closed upon me for some, which I am

sorry to say I had to refuse, as they were for the big and little

travellers. In the vans, &c., there would be an average of four

children, two men, and two women, and out of this vast mass of travellers

there would not be fifty who could read or write. “Of the persons,” says

the _Daily Telegraph_, “who were committed to prison last year, 60,840

could neither read nor write. Ignorance and crime go hand in hand

together. This is a fact beyond disputation.” In some of the vans I

counted eight children, besides the men and women. In one van there was

a man with a broken leg. In three other vans there were three men ill.

Several of the women had bruises upon their faces, and two had black

eyes, and the children were squatting about among the mud in the ditch.

“I was a taper smoking,

Lying by the footway,

Lease gleam of red away,

Smoke my thin flame choking.”

DR. GROSART, _Sunday at Home_.

Under the vans there were over a hundred lurcher dogs, ready for

anything, including white-tailed rabbits, “shoshi,” long-legged hares,

“kanégro,” and other trifles of this kind, down to a shin-bone of beef

hanging loosely in a butcher’s shop—aye, and a piece of a man’s calf if

he came too near to them and was not wanted. Gipsies’ dogs are so highly

trained that they understand a gipsy’s looks; and I should not be

surprised to hear that their dogs can “rocker” Romany. The dogs are

perfectly masters of the art of killing hedgehogs, _hotchi-witchi_. Like

their masters, they go stealthily to work and never “open.” Gipsy

poachers have been known to clear a field of hares and rabbits and “bag

their game” while the keepers have been lying in wait for them over the

fence.

Among the vans I came across, for the first time, a “George Smith” a

gipsy. I have met with any number of “John Smiths,” “Bill Smiths,” “Rily

Smiths,” but never a “George Smith.” This led me to have a long chat

with him and his wife. They are Oxfordshire gipsies, and from what I

learned afterwards they are “tidy sort of folks.” I felt inclined to

have a long conversation; in fact, I seemed to feel a greater interest in

him on account of his being a “George Smith” gipsy. The good woman and

her six children looked almost like pure gipsies, but such was not the

fact. They could “rocker” a little only, and got a fair living by

gambling in cocoa-nuts and horse-dealing. “George Smith” told me that he

never went more than fifty miles from home, and when he bought and sold

horses—of a third-rate kind—once he could do so the second time. All

horse-dealing gipsies are not of this class. Gipsies often told me that

they like to see fresh faces, fresh places, and fresh money. During my

conversation with Mrs. Smith, she said formerly she liked hedgehogs; but

since she had found out that “they liked beetles and snakes” her “stomach

had turned against them.” She went on to say, “I am no doctor, but I am

told by those who know, that the yellow fat inside a hedgehog, which you

know, sir, is from the poison of snakes and adders; hedgehogs are dead on

snakes and adders. Immediately a snake sees a hedgehog it kicks up a

terrible row, and tries to scamper off as fast as it can. No more

hedgehogs for me while I live; and I am sure our George will not have

any.” Not one of this family of Smiths could tell a letter, although

they sometimes sent their children to school a short time in the winter;

but, as the good woman said, “Lord bless you, my dear gentleman, what bit

they learn in the winter is gone again in the summer, and they are no

better for it.” I told them my plan for meeting their case, viz., by the

registration of their vans and a free education pass book for their

children, with which they heartily agreed. I left them several pleasing

children’s pictures, cards, &c., with which they were highly delighted,

and I then made my way to quell a gipsy row further on, which I found to

be, as usual, over the most trivial things. While I was busy among the

gipsies I saw two young ladies, I might almost say angels, from Oxford,

disregarding the rain, talking and distributing tracts among them. The

tracts were not exactly of the right kind; children’s religious pictorial

literature is what is the most pleasing, acceptable, and useful. Dry

tracts are no better than waste paper; and it is almost a waste of time

and money to distribute them. A little further on were three gentlemen

from Oxford discoursing to a group of gipsy children, and no doubt they

did some good; at least I hope so. If anything, their excellent

well-meant remarks were not made sufficiently interesting, or brought

down to the gipsy children and adults’ capacities. A wild, dry anecdote,

badly told, and without a pleasing and practical application, will not do

much good at any time.

In addressing gipsies, and other people of this class, two things are

needed to ensure success. There must either be the extreme earnestness

or the extreme simplicity, and no man or woman can succeed in winning

them over to virtuous paths unless these features are ever brought

prominently out. They must either be as Paul preaching to the Athenians,

or as Christ upon the Mount discoursing to the multitudes in deeply

interesting parables, put with an irresistible force of love and

simplicity; or as St. John the divine when surrounded by little children,

preaching with but few words, but speaking volumes of love in sympathetic

looks, melting tears, and gentle touches, reaching tender and obdurate

hearts in a Christ-like fashion, with a power that the devil himself

could not withstand. Love, earnestness, and child-like simplicity

brought to bear upon any gipsy children who are sharp and clever will

produce surprising heavenly results—aye, and from the gipsy men and women

too. In the gipsy mine there is room for all workers.

“Working together in the sacred mine,

We trace the veins of ore beneath our feet,

Till riches unimaginable greet.”

RICHARD WILTON, M.A., _Sunday at Home_, No. 1268.